So you think the Lebanon Valley escaped the wrath of what was left of Hurricane Sandy on Monday and Tuesday?

Try telling that to Leon and Jean Becker of Cornwall.

The couple were settling into bed shortly after midnight Tuesday, thinking they had weathered the worst of the storm at their home at 565 Hemlock Lane in Spring Hill Acres.

"We were just dozing off when we heard this enormous crash," said Leon Becker. "Of course, my wife screamed. I didn't know what had happened. We got up and looked around, and I went outside with a flashlight."

He was greeted with the sight of a huge oak that had been pulled up by its roots and had fallen onto the home he and his wife have occupied for nine years.

"I said, 'Oh boy!'" Becker recalled.

A view from inside the house of Leon and Jean Becker of Hemlock Drive, Spring Hill Acres, Cornwall, shows the oak tree that crashed through the roof. (LEBANON DAILY NEWS EARL BRIGHTBILL)

Inside the home, Becker discovered that a branch had stabbed through the ceiling of a guest bedroom, opening it up for the rain to gush through.

Not surprisingly, Becker said, he and his wife did not get much sleep the rest of the night.

After speaking with his insurance provider, Becker said, he contacted a repair and restoration company, which he hoped would remove the tree and make temporary repairs on Tuesday.

"We had damage to two rooms, so I would say the ceiling will have to be replaced as well as some walls, which were damaged by the water and the impact," he said. "But nobody got hurt. Thank God. It was just me and my wife here.

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Other Lebanon County residents also experienced property damage, but it was far less than expected from what was termed both a "superstorm" and "Frankenstorm" and had been heralded by weather forecasters since last week.

Locally, it packed nowhere near the widespread damage as Tropical Storm Lee last year. Most of Sandy's damage came as trees fell on electrical lines, causing power outages.

At 6 a.m. Tuesday, 13,000 Lebanon County residents were without power. By 12:30 p.m.

A branch from a huge oak tree pokes through the ceiling of the guest bedroom at Leon and Jean Becker s home at 565 Hemlock Lane in Spring Hill Acres, Cornwall, on Tuesday. The tree crashed onto the house Monday night during Hurricane Sandy. (LEBANON DAILY NEWS EARL BRIGHTBILL)

, 8,140 Met-Ed and 342 PPL customers were without electricity, according to the utilities' websites, firstenergycorp.com and pplelectric.com. By 5 p.m., those numbers had dropped to 5,688 and 147, respectively.

Met-Ed warned Tuesday that the preliminary outage numbers could climb as the storm makes its way inland.

FirstEnergy spokesman Scott Surgeoner said the initial areas with the highest number of power outages were the City of Lebanon and the townships of Jackson, Bethel, Swatara and Union.

FirstEnergy is the parent company of Met-Ed in the area. PPL's coverage area in Lebanon County is Heidelberg and Millcreek townships.

"Tuesday was the first time we could assess the damage," Surgeoner said.

Met-Ed crews spent Tuesday checking on the damage and taking care of the most hazardous situations and downed wires, he said. It will take at least a couple more days for power to be restored to all areas.

Because of the high winds, Surgeoner said, the company could not initially dispatch repair crews.

"With wind gusts 30 to 40 miles per hour, we're precluded from sending out crews in buckets," he said.

Utility crews came from Michigan, Minnesota, Illinois, Missouri and as far as Canada to assist FirstEnergy and other utility companies in restoring power in Lebanon County and throughout the Northeast, Surgeoner said. The company also has been in contact with utility companies in California and New Mexico.

"This was a large storm," he said. "It affected areas as far as Chicago, North Carolina, New York and New England."

Surgeoner said it's too early to say how much damage was caused by the storm, but "this is a very significant storm (that) exceeded last fall's storms."

Assessing the local damage was what Lebanon County Emergency Management Agency Director Dan Kauffman did on Tuesday.

"The next thing is damage assessment," he said. "We will need to look at properties to see how many were damaged and how badly. I am sure PEMA and FEMA will want those numbers pretty quickly," he added, referring to the Pennsylvania and Federal emergency management agencies.

Kauffman said he expected to find significant damage but, based on how events transpired during the height of the storm, it was not as bad as predicted. There have been no reports of death or injury, he said.

"Everything went fairly smoothly," he said. "It was fairly quiet. It wasn't much of a big deal at all. ... The fire companies were kept busy off and on. It seemed sporadic. They would be busy for 45 minutes to an hour, and then there would be a lull."

One frustration Kauffman noted was his inability to secure a generator for the Red Cross shelter at the Lebanon Valley Expo Center in North Cornwall Township. Fortunately, the shelter did not experience a power outage, so no generator was needed.

"I made the request (to PEMA) for a generator Saturday morning, and we wanted to stockpile water, as we were planning for the worst," he said. "In fact, I made two generator requests, and neither one was filled."

Kauffman speculated that the size of the generator requested may have been the reason why.

Generators were on hand and needed at Cedar Haven and the Lebanon County prison, where primary power went out at 10 p.m. Monday and wasn't restored until 8:30 a.m. Tuesday, said county administrator Jamie Wolgemuth.The county EMA will keep an eye on the status of those without power, Kauffman said. For now, anyone without electricity and proper supplies should use the Red Cross shelter.

"If this turns out to run for an extended number of days, then we will have to look at our needs at that point," he said. "Right now, people have a place to go where they can be fed and sleep. So we do have the resources here."

In addition, the National Weather Service reported Tuesday that the Swatara Creek at Harpers Tavern remained under a flood warning just before 4 p.m. The creek was at 9.3 feet, just above the 9-foot flood stage, and falling as of 3 p.m.